This invention relates generally to swimming pool accessories, and in particular to a buoyant lounge chair for supporting a person in a semi-reclining position while the chair is floating in water.
Swimming pools offer personal recreation and relaxation in a variety of settings, including private homes, apartment complexes, motels, resorts and country clubs. Various flotation devices including buoyant chairs, rafts, water wings, floating cushions and buoyant pool floats are used by swimmers as an aid for floating and relaxing on the surface of the water, while remaining seated upright, reclining or lounging, either partially or completely submerged. These items of pool furniture include flotation cushions made of a buoyant material such as open cell foam, closed cell foam, cork, kapok, fiberglass or balsa wood, which are sealed within a protective outer covering.
A popular item of pool furniture is the buoyant lounge chair which permits a swimmer to float on the surface of the water in a comfortable seated, reclining or lounging orientation. One limitation imposed by the construction of conventional lounge chairs is that the buoyant arm support sections are subject to tearing or deformation, and are also subject to collapse and separation from the chair frame at the interface between the arm support sections and the chair seat.
Another limitation imposed by the construction of conventional lounge chairs is in the lack of sufficient buoyancy material to maintain a stable upright orientation while the swimmer is in a reclining or lounging position. The buoyant lounge chair can overturn in response to shifting of its center of buoyancy, which occurs as the swimmer moves about while in a reclining or partially reclining orientation.
The external surface of the lounge chair is susceptible to attack by mildew, fungus, surface hardening, cracking and shrinking which occur as a result of long-term exposure to water, pool chemicals and solar radiation. Consequently, lounge chairs as well as other buoyant flotation devices are desirably protected by a coating of a durable, non-reactive plastic material, such as vinyl. The protective coating must be soft, pliable and able to withstand rough handling and high shear forces along the joinder lines between the chair arms, the chair seat and chair back.
The protective coating is applied by various processes, including dipping and spraying. According to a conventional coating process, a lounge chair to be treated with a protective coating is gripped on one end by a clamp and suspended while the protective coating is being applied to the lower section of the chair. After the protective coating has dried, the lounge chair is inverted and clamped on its opposite end to permit the untreated section of the chair to be coated. This two-step procedure requires additional labor and is generally unsatisfactory because of clamp marks and creases formed on the chair cushions which disfigure its surface appearance. Moreover, an uneven finish line is produced along the boundary of the separate protective coating layers when the lower and upper sections of the lounge chair are coated and dried separately.